Fellowship of Saints and Sinners

Saturday Silliness: Alternate Titles for Grace Sticks

After finishing Barbara Brown Taylor’s Leaving Church– more thoughts on this wonderful book later- I picked up Mindy Kaling’s Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (Reading Kaling is my way of grieving the departure of my favorite T.V. show, “The Office.”) Kaling begins her tome to humor for the sake of it, by listing all of the titles she almost gave her book. Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? could have been Sometimes You Just Have to Put on Lip Gloss and Pretend to be Psyched or Harry Potter Secret Book #8.

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Well, I’ve decided to take a page out of Kaling’s book. Here are my alternate titles for Grace Sticks:

Because Faith Is Too Important to Be Taken Seriously

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs (The Sequel)

Did I Really Just Say That?

How I Met James Bond in an Airplane (you really will have to read the book if you want to know!)

“Twilight” for Morning Lovers

The Young and The Restless

I Shouldn’t Be Alive (inspired by one of my favorite T.V. documentary shows that features hair-raising true stories of people who almost die from shark attacks, black mamba bites and shipwrecks)

The Book That You Haven’t Been Waiting For But Still Have to Buy (Or Else I’ll Come Find You)

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Your Best Life…Never Got Any Worse (Move on over, Joel Osteen.)

A Wrinkle in Faith

Marcus Mumford, I Love You

The Purpose-Driven Life on Steroids (Rick Warren and I would’ve teamed up to write it.)

Sorry, I don’t have an alternate title for you, but your blog did give me a chuckle mixed with a dose of serious thought.

My amusement came from remembering trying to come up with a title for my first novel–which is still a work in progress. I’ve been at it now for more than two years and it’s still not finished. Anyway, about six months ago a title finally came to me. And when it did, I knew it was perfect! It fits so very well that I really must finish the book now! HAH!

The novel is based upon a short story I wrote over twenty years ago that I entitled, Bay Street. It’s a Christmas fantasy about a young man who suddenly finds himself in a strange place having lost all memory of his life…including his own name. I liked the character so much that I wanted his life to continue. Thus, my attempt at the novel.
BTW: If you’d like to read the short story, I’d be happy to email you a PDF copy…. (It only takes about 15 minutes to read.)

My serious thoughts are regarding Grace. As providence would have it, I read the following quote by Bono just a few minutes ago and wanted to share.

Blessings to you,

Michael

Bono’s quote:

“[Grace is] my favorite word in the lexicon of the English language. It’s a word I’m depending on. The universe operates by Karma, we all know that. For every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction. There is some atonement built in: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Then enters Grace and turns that upside down. I love it. I’m not talking about people being graceful in their actions but just covering over the cracks. Christ’s ministry really was a lot to do with pointing out how everybody is a screw-up in some shape or form, there’s no way around it. But then He was to say, well, I am going to deal with those sins for you. I will take on Myself all the consequences of sin. Even if you’re not religious, I think you’d accept that there are consequences to all the mistakes we make. And so Grace enters the picture to say, I’ll take the blame, I’ll carry the cross. It is a powerful idea. Grace interrupting Karma.”